


East End Blues

by loveydoveywlw



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU
Genre: Angst, Dialogue Heavy, First Meetings, I'll add tags as it goes, M/M, POV Jason Todd, Secret Identity
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-21
Updated: 2018-09-21
Packaged: 2019-07-15 02:32:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16053596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loveydoveywlw/pseuds/loveydoveywlw
Summary: The new cafe in the East End district isn't good enough to make Jason come back, but Kyle might just be.





	East End Blues

**Author's Note:**

> An anon asked for "good jaykyle." I can't promise that this is good, but it is Jaykyle?
> 
> This isn't a total AU. It's the same universe, same set up, same game plan as canon (if any comic universes are canon lmao), but in this one, Jason and Kyle didn't meet around Donna. There was no Countdown situation where they met, and they haven't clashed any other times, either. If anything, I guess this could be a meetcute? A secret identity au? Who knows! Just take it as it is (complete Jason and Jaykyle indulgence). There's a good 90% chance I'll continue this, so I've marked it as ongoing. That being said, it's ambiguous enough for you to read the first part alone and not be bothered lmao.

Jason finds himself inside of a weird, somewhat-seedy cafe hidden somewhere in the depths of Gotham’s East End district. It’s not quite in Crime Alley, but it’s close enough to it that business shouldn’t be as booming as it is. Quietly, he slips into a blessedly empty corner table closest to the front door and sets his cup down on it.

He doesn’t know what he’s doing there. In the cafe, yeah, but also in East End. Gotham. He shouldn’t be there; Bruce has made it clear that he wants very little to do with Jason now that he’s got younger— _better_ , the voice in the back of his head chimes —family members to worry about. Hell, one of them is his actual, real-life, biological son. The kid’s got the barely-masked impulsivity to prove it, too. And Duke? He’s everything that Jason wishes he could have been: smart, focused, funny, kind, _and_ likeable. He can’t fault him for being a good guy.

He can’t fault any of them for being more deserving of Bruce’s love than he is.

So why is he sitting there in a shitty hipster cafe in the middle of Gotham, sipping his frappuccino (with three shots of espresso) and frowning down at his silent phone? No one’s texting him. No one’s expecting him. No one’s waiting for him.

The chair across from his scrapes across the linoleum floor, jolting him from his thoughts. He blinks at his drink once, raises his eyes to look at the person across from him, and then blinks at them, too.

Neither one of them speaks. Jason refuses to open his mouth and lose the battle of wills that may or may not being going on. This was his spot first, dammit. He’s not going to be the one to break the silence when he wasn’t the one to sit at an already occupied table. It’s not his responsibility. So they sit there, mouths shut, and stare at each other for what feels like eons.

Jason notices that the guy across from him has nice eyes right before those eyes glance down at the table almost sheepishly. “Sorry. Every other table was occupied, and you seemed like the safest bet.”

He barely resists scoffing at that. _Safe_ is not something that has been associated with Jason for a very long time. Instead, he leans back in his seat and takes a drag from his drink. “It’s no problem,” he says. He looks around the room and sees that the guy is right; the place is even more busy than when he’d first entered. “I’m almost done here, anyway.”

“Oh.” It might be his imagination, but the guy seems to deflate a little bit at that. It happens too quickly for him to tell for sure. “If I’m bothering you, you can tell me. I’m not gonna go secretly cry in the bathroom about it.”

Jason arches an eyebrow at that. “You’re not bothering me.” It feels like a challenge.

“Good.”

“Good.”

After another tense silence, the guy pulls out an expensive drawing tablet (Jason knows that it’s expensive because he considered getting one for Damian) and starts to sketch. Jason goes back to his coffee, which is almost gone at that point. He’s strangely aware of the other man at the table; he can hear his breathing, he can sense when he doesn’t like what he’s done in his drawing and goes to erase it, and he can tell that his shoulders have been tensing up gradually ever since they last spoke.

Finally, Jason sighs. “Okay,” he mutters to himself before he speaks louder. “Fine. I’m Jason. You are. . . ?”

The hand with the pen pauses, and then, reluctantly, he says, “Kyle.”

“Kyle,” Jason repeats, feeling the way the name sounds from his mouth. “Well, Kyle, I don’t know what to say besides maybe warning you that I’m kind of a dick.”

Kyle’s green eyes peek up at him, assessing. Jason has no idea what he finds, but for some reason he feels self-conscious under his attention now. “To be fair,” he says, “I’m also kind of a dick.”

The “I caught that” slips out of Jason without his permission. He would feel worse about it if it didn’t make Kyle laugh as hard as it does. A warm feeling starts to spread through his chest at the sound, and he would try to fight it more, but it’s been so long since he felt good like this, so he doesn’t. He lets it wash through him like a wave, moving through his body, sloshing around in his stomach, and finally cresting over his heart until it feels a little bit lighter.

He hasn’t made anyone laugh in a very long time. It feels nice.

Jason’s officially done with his drink at that point, but he doesn’t move from his spot. He stays there and pretends not to notice it, and Kyle does the same. The conversation has lulled again, but it feels less antagonistic, and more comfortable. When the silence is broken, it feels almost jarring.

“So why this cafe?”

Jason could pretend to not understand what he’s asking. He considers it briefly, but then decides against it. “I honestly don’t know.” It’s true when he says it, but something about it feels off after. He tries again, and it feels a little more right this time. “Maybe I just missed home.”

It’s Kyle’s turn to raise an eyebrow. “You consider this cafe your home?” he asks, his voice thick with judgment. “You don’t really seem the type to like gentrification, but, hey, what do I know?”

“No,” Jason says with a snort. “Gotham. East End. The whole shebang, honestly.”

“Really?” He’s stopped drawing altogether, his attention fully on Jason. “The city notorious for chewing its inhabitants up and then spitting them back out? You consider it your _home_?”

Jason bristles slightly at his tone, but it makes him realize something: Kyle’s not from the city. Anyone from Gotham understands the pull that the it has over them—it’s the one thing that unifies a population otherwise hell-bent on ruining itself from the inside-out. “What, did the accent not give me away enough?”

Kyle shrugs, unperturbed. “All Jersey people sound the same to me.” He nibbles on his pen in consideration and then shrugs again. “And, honestly? Your accent’s not even that strong.”

That would be Bruce’s doing. Jason had almost forgotten about the years of prim little diction lessons, taught by Bruce _and_ Alfred. And then there were the years after that where he was . . . otherwise occupied. For some reason, the knowledge that he’s lost his accent makes him feel sad.

Maybe that’s just Jason’s curse: he’ll never get to be who he once was, before.

“Anyway,” Kyle continues. “Maybe it’s different for you than it is for me. I’ve never really been the kind of person to feel like any one place is my home, when there are so many possibilities out there to explore. Greener pastures and all that.” He chuckles, as if he’s made a joke that went over Jason’s head.

Jason hums in response. “Who knows? Maybe there’s some sort of chemical in the smog here that makes it impossible to leave.” The moment it’s out of his mouth, he pauses, and then makes a mental note to ask the big man about it when they’re on speaking terms again. Just to be safe.

“With all of the weird, strangely niche villains in Gotham?” Kyle smirks at him; Jason tries very hard not to find it attractive. “It would probably be a normal Monday for you guys. ‘Ah, there goes Smogman with his smog! Silly Smogman!’”

“Smogman’s more of a Thursday kinda fella, actually.”

They share a grin, and it feels like a promise.


End file.
